


summer song

by kiden



Category: Bandom, Fall Out Boy
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-03
Updated: 2018-08-03
Packaged: 2019-06-21 00:18:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15545442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kiden/pseuds/kiden
Summary: hey both watch Patrick disappear down the corridor and it’s another minute before Pete asks, “What did that sound like to you? Is it whatever he doesn’t want to talk about, or he doesn’t want to talk to me specifically?"(repost)





	summer song

The sound of the crowd follows them off stage, the ecstatic roar ebbing away to the softer rumble of people gathering their things and making their way home. There’s always a flurry of movement, the aftermath blizzard of every show, and Patrick stands off to the side, tucked just offstage and out of the way, long past the end of the commotion. A water bottle held loose in his hand, lost somewhere, eyes open but not seeing. Pete draws the short straw this time, and he’s never been certain if it’s considered a loss or not. He’s always thought of it as a victory. He can see sweat rolling down the side of Patrick’s face and neck, his shirt still soaked through from the show, and when he touches his shoulder Patrick is a thousand degrees, and tense as a motherfucker.

“Dude, there’s still some stragglers out back if you wanna sign some shit,” Pete says, trying not to let it sting when Patrick shrugs away from his touch. “And the convoy wants to head out soon, so -.”

The only response Patrick gives is a curt nod, his eyes still focused on something distant, something that’s not Pete. It was always like this for a time, but Pete labels that Before in his head and they’d both agreed it wasn’t a place they wanted to visit anymore. Part of the reconcilement agreement was that Patrick wasn’t allowed to shut them out again, isn’t allowed to hold it in until it’s unfixable. But Pete knows that’s not what’s happening here - the tour’s been long, and hard, and they are all wearing thin. One bad night isn’t enough to send him into panic mode these days.

Still, there’s something nagging at the center of his mind, something off. So he casts a quick look back at Joe, just to confirm it’s okay to press, and says, “You wanna talk about it?”

 “No,” Patrick says immediately, pushing off the wall and turning away. “I don’t want to talk about this with you.”

They both watch Patrick disappear down the corridor and it’s another minute before Pete asks, “What did that sound like to you? Is it whatever-the-fuck he doesn’t want to talk about, or he doesn’t want to talk to me specifically?”

“Don’t know,” Joe says, and bumps his shoulder into Pete’s. “Inflection’s a bitch, man.”

The nagging thing in Pete’s head just grows though as Joe slings an arm around his shoulders, a move that turns quickly into a short and sweet wrestling match. As soon as he gets Trohman to the floor Pete takes off, sprinting down the same hall Patrick did, horse-laughing his way through the venue when Joe gives chase. The hot summer air slams them to a halt when they make it out back, fight forgotten, the buses lined up and running with a few people still milling about. Along the fence, Pete catches sight of Patrick and Andy, both of them sitting on the ground, Patrick’s knees drawn up to his chest. He looks small, and ten years ago, and the world tilts just for a second.

The way Andy is talking looks soft, and Pete’s been on the receiving end of that look a thousand times, the concern between his eyebrows and the careful touch of his hand.

“See?” Joe says, and hits Pete on the back of the head. “He’s fine. Andy’s working that Hurley magic.”

“I see,” Pete says, but he doesn’t agree at all. -

It takes two entire days for it to be normal again. By the next show, whatever was hanging over Patrick’s head is gone, the rain clouds rolling away and it’s all bright blue skies. His laugh rings as loud as ever at Pete’s dumb jokes at catering, his eyes clear and focused on him, the way that Pete’s always liked them best. There’s a tune in his humming that Pete doesn’t recognize, and it’s good, it’s great, and maybe it’s something Patrick is working on - which is always a good sign. He thinks, you were the song stuck in my head, and that’s good too, so he writes it down on a napkin, watching Patrick lift his hat off his head for a moment to straighten it.

He tweets, checks his blog and what the kids are saying about them today, calls his sister. And everything is fine, really, and he tries his best to convince himself it’s true, Brendon and Patrick head to head fucking around on a laptop, both of them now on vocal rest. It’s fine. Normal.

Except that he’s absolutely certain that nothing is okay, and it’s an ugly, creeping feeling that spreads in his chest. Either Patrick is lying or Pete can’t read him like he used to, and neither one of those are thoughts he wants to entertain.

“Just leave it,” Andy says by way of a greeting. He doesn’t sit with Pete, just looms over him and shrugs. “He’s fine.”

“Bullshit.”

“You don’t have to know everything about him all the time,” Andy says, and leaves. Just like that. As though that’s a reasonable exit line.

Of course I do, Pete thinks. The thought is loud, high-pitched and frantic, and he holds on to his phone tighter just to keep his hands still. He stopped paying attention once. There’d been a terrible time when he didn’t know anything about what was going on in Patrick’s head, and he’d lost everything. Lost Patrick in the mess of both their thoughts, in distance. That would never happen again.

When he looks up Patrick looks away, rubbing his arm just above the elbow, the way Pete knows means he’s anxious. Just one of a hundred and one of Patrick’s nervous ticks sorted and filed a long time ago. But Brendon keeps looking, smiles in a strange un-Brendon like way that doesn’t reach his eyes. Andy might be a fortress, but Brendon isn’t. There’s no way that Patrick confided in Urie, but there’s something on his face that’s in the know. And Pete smiles back all teeth and promise, and Brendon is smart enough to look properly fucked about it.

-

“What?” he demands. The patented Andy Hurley way of starting a conversation. “And don’t say you don’t know what I’m talking about because I’ll punch you in the balls, dude.”

Brendon lets out a long, low sound of frustration and caps it off with an animated shrug, his head bouncing back against the tour bus. “It’s not a secret,” he says, “like, the entire audience and their cameras were there. He’s probably just embarrassed that’s all.”

“About what?”

The look on Brendon’s face would be funny if they were talking about anyone but Patrick. But they are, so the wide-eyed look of shock and amusement just makes Pete want to hit him harder than originally planned. “Pete, man, he was crying.”

And then, suddenly, Pete remembers. The way his fingers had slipped and stilled on the keyboard. The longer than usual silence, the way he fucking sniffled, and how Brendon had saddled up to him, a flash of comfort before jumping into 20 Dollar Nose Bleed.

“Oh,” Pete says, and takes a step back. Because, seriously, fucking oh.  
-

It’s not new information. Patrick has admitted, to more than just Pete and their friends, that the song made him cry. It’s something Pete’s never really understood how to feel about. The song is Patrick’s; Pete wrote it for rainy days, for the blues that Patrick shoulders sometimes, for when he feels bad about himself and the world and like he can’t carry it all anymore. It was about Patrick, and the two of them together, the four of them as a band, and the amazing things Patrick can pull out of the not-always-bleak world. The things he could pull out of Pete, and the things they could make together.

It was about how Patrick saved him, and how desperately he just wanted Patrick to be able to see himself through Pete’s own eyes, just for five minutes.

It was a love song in any way that Patrick wanted to take it. The only way Pete could write one for him, sad and a little hopeful, thankful, and with a lot of yearning.

He’d never really thought about how Patrick would react to it, so focused on saying it loud enough for the world to hear. But when Pete thinks about him crying over it, it pulls at something unexpected inside of him. Something tender and vulnerable and not particularly surprising, just usually ignored.

There was something Pete had been looking for, like the song was a question and Patrick was supposed to answer it. It was big and important, and Pete needed all their friends to ask it, a chorus of love behind a question mark.

Asked in the best way he’d be sure Patrick would listen, with Elvis Costello.

And when he thinks about Patrick crying, it feels like an answer. Pete’s just never been able to figure out what either of them are saying.

-

The last show of a tour always feels different in the same way the first one does. The crowd is louder than normal, reaching out to them and waving their phones, and it’s not just Pete that’s feeding off the energy. All the months of road weariness fade away, just like that, and there’s something in Pete’s blood that feels more reckless than usual. Tomorrow he’ll be home, the day after that he’ll have his kid and Cartoon Network and, yeah, he can’t fucking wait for that. But right now is this and nothing else but Patrick throwing himself against his mic stand, and it feels like if Pete doesn’t figure it out before the night is over he’s never going to know.

In a few minutes he’s going to throw himself into the crowd, and the tour is going to be done, so it has to be now. Pete doesn’t let himself think about it. Patrick launches into Saturday and suddenly Pete is pressing himself to his side like he used to, letting his lips slide along the stubble of his jaw and the sweat-soaked skin of his neck.

They didn’t talk about this, but they hadn’t really needed to. It had been, simply, no more bullshit on stage, and Patrick’s face looked so serious that Pete couldn’t argue. There was always a part of Patrick that hated it, the rolling-his-eyes cynical bit that understood how shit worked, and how far a little stage-gay could go if you really dedicated yourself to it. And he’d never been able to convince Patrick that showmanship had nothing to do with it. High off the fans and the music and the sound of Patrick’s voice, it was always genuine.

It never made sense how Patrick could think it was only ever a show, when Pete had been drawn magnetically to him even without an audience. Young and stupid and chased by nightmares directly into Patrick’s lap or bed, just to press his face against the expanse of his back and feel home again. Patrick was always the place Pete ran to, for good or bad.

His voice falters, just for a second, and Pete can feel Patrick tremble. He moves away just enough to get Pete off of him, stares at him with fire in his eyes - Patrick is furious, and as soon as this show is over, Pete is going to be on the receiving end of it. But it’s fine. Maybe it’s what he wanted.

The crowd opens their arms to him and he almost wants to tell security to let him go. To let the kids take him. Let them hold him up. It’s not like they haven’t done it before.

-

As soon as the show is over Patrick is gone and Pete’s doesn’t see him again until he climbs into his bus. Sitting on the couch, he’s got his hat off, a hand over his face, and his leg is bouncing at record pace. He’s going to throw a punch. Pete can see it in all the lines of his body.

Except when Patrick moves his hand away he’s not mad anymore. All he looks is tired, rundown, and he says, “I told you to stop doing that.”

‘Sorry’ is on the tip of his tongue, but he’s not sorry. Has never been sorry about that, no matter how much Patrick seems to want him to be. So he bites it back and shrugs, grabbing a water bottle from the fridge. “It was the last show, dude. I got caught up.”

Patrick stares at him for a long moment, closed off and unreadable. It makes Pete feel edgy and wrecked. They talked about a lot before the band reformed, tried their best to make sure everything would be better this time. That they wouldn’t trip into the same pitfalls. Pete’s known a lot of bands over the years, has seen members fight and break up and spin away from each other. Fall Out Boy was never supposed to be like that. They weren’t like that. And when they were it was the end of the fucking world for him. It just hadn’t made any sense.

Him and Patrick had never fought like strangers before. And when they did, Pete’s heart broke.

Patrick continues to not say anything, so Pete strips off his shirt and heads to the back of the bus and jumps into the shower he hates using. To give Patrick time to leave, or stay, or gather his thoughts because this conversation isn’t over. Pete’s not stupid enough to think it is. When he makes his way to the front again Patrick is sitting exactly where Pete left him, his hair sticking up and eyes closed.

He’s so still that Pete thinks he’s sleeping, until he says, “I just don’t get it.”

“What part?” Pete asks, and sits at the table. Opens his laptop. Pretends nothing at all is happening.

“I thought I understood for a long time, you know? I thought it was just how you were, because you were like that with everyone. You, you were so fucking handsy all the time, and I like, I thought this is just because he’s messed up sometimes.” Patrick sighs, and Pete keeps his eyes on his computer, his heart pounding heavy in his chest, in his wrists and head. “I thought it was just because you were afraid of people leaving you, so, so you held on to them, but.”

“But?” Pete encourages. Hiding behind his laptop screen.

“I was so fucking mad at myself, Pete. For not being able to handle it anymore. For, you know, I felt so selfish and needy. I didn’t want you to be like that with everyone. I wanted, I wanted it to be something that made me special. You were everyone’s but they didn’t have you at night or -. You didn’t talk about them like you talked about me. I thought because I got all the bad parts too that it made it different. And I was so fucking mad at you because it wasn’t.”

Pete closes his laptop with a sharp snap and sees that Patrick’s eyes are still closed. He still looks asleep. He says, “It was different. It was always different.”

“No it wasn’t,” Patrick says, and turns his face away. Something cold shoots through Pete, terrified that Patrick might be crying. “Not in the way I thought it was. Or where I thought it was going.”

“Patrick -.”

“You got married,” he blurts, sitting up and opening his eyes and looking horrified by his own words. “You got her pregnant and you married her and you were so fucking happy, and, and talking about forever. I felt - I didn’t understand - which was stupid, because I knew it wasn’t going to happen. You’d never - with a guy, you’d never. But you made me believe it anyway. And then you left.”

Pete watches Patrick take off his fogged glasses to wipe his eyes and nose, and everything feels far away, his body numb. There’s no fucking way to process this, no way to explain or make it better. He’s been trying for over ten years to make sense of this, of the way he feels about Patrick compared to the way he feels about the world. He’s given a thousand interviews, written a hundred blog posts, wrote one perfect song and dozens of one-off lines. But he’s no closer to an answer. And that’s always been the real problem.

He’s not sorry for any of it, because taking even a moment of it back would be taking away his son, and he’ll never be something Pete regrets. But it was different with Patrick, and he’d always wanted him in a scary, confusing, consuming way. Just could never imagine how. How to keep Patrick the way he really wanted to and still keep the band, to make sure Patrick’s private life stayed as private as he needs it to be, how to love him completely but keep them both out of the headlines.

“I love you,” Pete says, because it’s the only thing to say. The only three words ever in his mouth. “I just don’t know how.”

A sick laugh falls out of Patrick’s mouth and he covers his eyes with his hand, sniffling wetly. When he looks up at Pete his eyes are big and glassy, red and exhausted, and he shakes his head.

“Tell me you love me, Patrick,” he says, sliding out of the booth and to the floor in front of him. “Say it back.”

He shakes his head again, tilting his face towards the roof, “I can’t.”

Pete pushes his way between Patrick’s legs, slipping his arms around his waist and drawing him closer. Presses his forehead to Patrick’s shaking chest. “On three, okay?” Pete whispers. “One.”

His fingers twist into Patrick’s shirt, holding him tight.

“Two.”

Pete lets go, moves his hands to Patrick’s face and brings it back down to look at him, “I’m right here, dude. Open your eyes and look at me.” And Patrick does, so Pete smiles at him, softly with no teeth.

“Three.”

His mouth opens but nothing comes out, instead Patrick falls down against him, into his lap, and fits his lips on top of Pete’s. It’s their first real kiss, one they’ve been writing for years, and it’s more than fireworks and explosions. It’s careful and sad and when Patrick grasps at him, his hands strong and greedy on Pete’s back, it’s absolutely perfect.

“I love you,” he says brokenly, pushing the words directly into Pete. “I’ve never not, I’ve never not loved you. I’m sorry.”

Pete knows. It’s the only thing he’s ever really known, felt it in his bones, where he always feels Patrick.

When they break apart Patrick’s face is wet, and Pete keeps him close, brushes his thumbs across his cheeks and smooths his hair out of his face. He’s still the most beautiful thing Pete’s ever seen, ever touched - he still feels like safety and home. “It was different,” Pete says, and kisses his forehead, his cheekbone. “You know it was different.”

“What now?” Patrick asks, touching Pete’s face, his neck, the line of his shoulder. The way he used to in the van, in shitty motel rooms, squeezed together in their very first tour bus. Pete leans his head against Patrick’s chin, and laughs.

“I’m fucking tired, so, now we sleep,” he whispers. “And then tomorrow everything is the same except now, this. Now we kiss more than we used to. We’ll figure it out.”

“But you’re not -.”

  
Pete leans back to look at him, to meet his eyes and make sure Patrick understands, that there’s noconfusion this time. “It’s you, and I’m fluid as fuck, dude. There’s not one part of you I don’t want.”

“Okay,” Patrick nods, and believes him. His face is dry and there’s a playful curve at the corner of his mouth that Pete wants to kiss, so he does. Answers it by hefting Patrick back onto the couch, knocking him back and raising his legs into the air and sliding between them. “You stupid fuck,” Patrick says, but he’s laughing. “Get the fuck off me, moron.”

“Never,” Pete promises, covers Patrick’s body with his own and grins between chaste butterfly kisses. “This is it, man, now you’re stuck with me for real. I’m sewing us together.”

Patrick chuckles, knocks up against Pete with his shoulder, throwing him off enough to get his hands between them and pushes Pete to the floor. “I’ve made a huge mistake.”

“Oh, fucking definitely,” Pete laughs, and grabs at Patrick’s legs, dragging him down with him.


End file.
